Systems and methods of controlling delivery of retail products

ABSTRACT

In some embodiments, systems and methods are provided to enable product deliveries based on an interruption condition, comprising: a delivery scheduling system; a cancellation system; and a time reserving system; wherein the delivery scheduling system comprises a delivery scheduling control circuit configured identify that a delivery interruption condition exists for a delivery day; the cancellation system is configured to identify multiple scheduled product deliveries on the delivery day that are to be halted; the time reserving system is configured to: identify a non-interrupted second delivery day, and reserve at least a portion of the second delivery day; and block the reserved portion of the second delivery day and prevent previously unscheduled deliveries from being scheduled during the reserved portion; and the delivery scheduling control circuit is configured to reschedule a delivery of a halted product delivery during the reserved portion of the second delivery day.

CROSS-REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATION

This Application is a continuation of U.S. application Ser. No.15/581,294 filed Apr. 28, 2017, which claims the benefit of U.S.Provisional Application No. 62/329,396, filed Apr. 29, 2016, each ofwhich is incorporated herein by reference in its entirety.

TECHNICAL FIELD

This invention relates generally to controlling the delivery ofproducts.

BACKGROUND

In a modern retail environment, there is a need to improve the customerservice and/or convenience for the customer. One aspect of customerservice is having products available for customers. Another aspect canbe providing customers with options to have products delivered.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

Disclosed herein are embodiments of systems, apparatuses, methods andprocesses pertaining to controlling the delivery of retail products.This description includes drawings, wherein:

FIG. 1 illustrates a simplified block diagram of an exemplary deliverycontrol system, in accordance with some embodiments.

FIG. 2 illustrates a simplified block diagram of an exemplary process ofcontrolling product deliveries, in accordance with some embodiments.

FIG. 3 illustrates an exemplary system for use in implementing methods,techniques, systems, devices, apparatuses, servers, sources and the likein controlling the delivery of products in accordance with someembodiments.

Elements in the figures are illustrated for simplicity and clarity andhave not necessarily been drawn to scale. For example, the dimensionsand/or relative positioning of some of the elements in the figures maybe exaggerated relative to other elements to help to improveunderstanding of various embodiments of the present invention. Also,common but well-understood elements that are useful or necessary in acommercially feasible embodiment are often not depicted in order tofacilitate a less obstructed view of these various embodiments of thepresent invention. Certain actions and/or steps may be described ordepicted in a particular order of occurrence while those skilled in theart will understand that such specificity with respect to sequence isnot actually required. The terms and expressions used herein have theordinary technical meaning as is accorded to such terms and expressionsby persons skilled in the technical field as set forth above exceptwhere different specific meanings have otherwise been set forth herein.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION

The following description is not to be taken in a limiting sense, but ismade merely for the purpose of describing the general principles ofexemplary embodiments. Reference throughout this specification to “oneembodiment,” “an embodiment,” “some embodiments”, “an implementation”,“some implementations”, “some applications”, or similar language meansthat a particular feature, structure, or characteristic described inconnection with the embodiment is included in at least one embodiment ofthe present invention. Thus, appearances of the phrases “in oneembodiment,” “in an embodiment,” “in some embodiments”, “in someimplementations”, and similar language throughout this specificationmay, but do not necessarily, all refer to the same embodiment.

Generally speaking, pursuant to various embodiments, systems,apparatuses, methods and processes are provided herein to facilityand/or control product deliveries. In some embodiments the systemidentifies that a delivery interruption condition exists for at least asubsequent first delivery day and corresponding to one or more retailshopping facilities. The interruption condition can be substantially anyrelevant condition that may cause the interruption of the delivery ofproducts from a retail facility to customers. For example, someinterruption conditions result when conditions make it unsafe to performproduct deliveries on one or more days, and in some instances for partof a day. The system further identifies multiple scheduled productdeliveries that are scheduled to be delivered from a retail shoppingfacility on the delivery day when the interruption condition isforecasted and/or is occurring. As a result of the interruptioncondition, the system further identifies and/or designates thesescheduled product deliveries to be halted, suspended or cancelled. Thesystem identifies one or more subsequent non-interrupted delivery days,which occur in time after the halted delivery day, and are forecasted tonot have an interruption condition. At least a portion of the subsequentnon-interrupted delivery day can be reserved to be available to allowcustomers associated with halted product deliveries to reschedule thehalted product deliveries. Further, in some implementations, the systemblocks the reserved portion of the subsequent non-interrupted deliveryday and prevents previously unscheduled deliveries associated with theshopping facility from being scheduled during the reserved portion ofthe subsequent non-interrupted delivery day. The system can furtherreserve rescheduled deliveries of one or more of the halted productdeliveries during the reserved portion of the subsequent non-interrupteddelivery day based on communication from respective customers.

Other delivery scheduling systems do not have rescheduling capabilitiesto accommodate multiple and often large numbers of interrupteddeliveries. Instead, many of these other previous scheduling systemsrequire customers to settle for the rescheduling assigned by thedelivery service. Still other systems may allow customers to reschedule,but typically the reschedule times are not optimal because othercustomers continue to reserve times and prevent customers that have haddeliveries interrupted from selecting optimal times. Further, such othersystems typically do not prioritize customers that have had deliveriesinterrupted, and typically do not prioritize rescheduled deliveries as afunction of interruption and the types of products to be delivered. Thepresent embodiments, however, improve rescheduling of product deliverieswhen relatively large quantities of deliveries are interrupted becauseof conditions within a geographic area, such as weather, naturaldisaster, forest fire, and the like. Further, some present embodimentsreserve at least portions of one or more subsequent days or periods oftime to be available to those customers that have had their deliveriesinterrupted so that these customers can obtain a desirable delivery timeand receive their orders in a timely manner and in accordance with theirschedules. This greatly improves customer satisfaction while alsoallowing the deliveries to be optimized at least in part for thosecustomers that have had their deliveries interrupted.

FIG. 1 illustrates a simplified block diagram of an exemplary deliverycontrol system 100, in accordance with some embodiments. The deliverycontrol system includes one or more delivery scheduling systems 102 thatare associated with one or more retail shopping facilities. Further, thesystem includes one or more cancellation systems 104, communicationsystems 106 and time reserving systems 108 communicatively coupled withthe delivery scheduling system. In some implementations, the deliverycontrol system 100 includes one or more delivery routing systems 112,product ordering systems 114, and/or a product picking scheduling system116. Some embodiments may include and/or communicatively couple with oneor more inventory systems 118, databases 122, third party services 124(e.g., weather forecasting services, environment and/or atmosphereconditions reporting services, etc.), user computing devices 130, andthe like. Typically, one or more computer and/or communication networks126 establish communication connections between two or more of thecomponents of the system 100 and components outside the system, andallow communications and/or data transmissions between two or more ofthe components of the system 100 and/or outside the system. For example,the network may include one or more local area networks (LAN), wide areanetworks (WAN), the Internet, cellular networks, local wirelessnetworks, and/or other such communication and/or computer networks. Thesystem 100 further includes and/or is in communication with one or moredelivery vehicles 128 that can communicate status information, locationinformation, completed delivery information, and/or other suchinformation.

The delivery control system 100, in some embodiments, is geographicallydistributed over multiple geographic areas, with multiple deliveryscheduling systems 102, cancellation systems 104, communication systems106, time reserving systems 108 and/or other systems further distributedacross two or more of the geographic areas. This distribution provides ageographically distributed system, while further providing distributedprocessing and data storage. Further still, the geographic distributionof the delivery control system 100 provides redundancy, and/orduplicity. In some embodiments, one or more of the systems and/ordatabases 122 and/or portions of the data maintained in the databasesare duplicated to enable multiple sources of access while providingredundancy in an event of one or more failures. The geographicdistribution and redundancy can be particularly advantageous whenconditions within a geographic area cause a portion of the deliverycontrol system 100 to fail or operation be temporarily interrupted, suchas from a natural disaster, failure of local infrastructure, and thelike.

The delivery scheduling system 102 is configured to receive anotification and/or identify when a delivery interruption conditionexists. The notification may be received from a remote central systemthat tracks weather conditions, emergency conditions, receivesnotifications from emergency services or other third party services 124,and the like. Additionally or alternatively, the identification can bebased on the delivery scheduling system evaluating current conditions(e.g., current weather conditions, current emergency situations, statusof emergency conditions, etc.), forecasted conditions (e.g., forecastedweather conditions, forecasted emergency events, forecasted emergencysituations, etc.), and/or other relevant information. In some instances,the delivery scheduling system accesses information from one or moresources, such as weather services, emergency response agencies,government agencies, other such sources, and often a combination of twoor more of such sources. Further, the delivery scheduling system mayreceive forecasting information, may receive notifications from acentral system (e.g., a central system of a chain of retail stores), mayreceive notifications from government agencies and/or emergency services(e.g., government road services, fire departments, police departments,etc.), or other such sources. Using this information, the deliveryscheduling system can access one or more rules databases 122 and applyone or more cancellation rules to identify when a delivery interruptioncondition exists. For example, the delivery scheduling system mayreceive forecasted weather data that forecasts based on one or moreapplied rules a threshold level of snow. The threshold may be specifiedby a government agency, historic data (e.g., levels of snow that arereadily handled by street crews, historic requests by governmentagencies that people not use the roads, etc.). As another example, thedelivery scheduling system may receive a weather warning from agovernment agency requesting that people avoid traveling on the roads.Similarly, one or more rules may be applied based on historic roadconditions relative to weather conditions, historic accident reportsrelative to weather conditions, etc. In some embodiments, the rules whenapplied provide results that are inconsistent with other deliverysystems. Because the delivery control system 100 improves the ability tosubsequently deliver products, the delivery control system can applyrules that would define a day or portion of a day as an interruptioncondition when other systems would continue to attempt to completedeliveries. Accordingly, the delivery control system improves workersafety as well as the safety of the public at large because the systemhas the ability to set lower thresholds of when an interruptioncondition exists, yet still providing customers the ability to readilyreschedule their interrupted deliveries and thus improve customersatisfaction.

When the interruption condition exists, the delivery scheduling systemnotifies the cancellation system 104, which is configured to access oneor more rules and/or rules databases and evaluate scheduled deliveriesrelative to one or more estimated times of delivery interruptionrelative to one or more rules of a set of cancellation rules todetermine whether such conditions are predicted to interfere withscheduled delivery of products to customers from one or more brick andmortar retail and/or shopping facilities. The retail and/or shoppingfacility may be a retail sales facility, a fulfillment center, adistribution center, or any other type of facility in which products aresold and/or distributed to customers. The facility may be any size orformat, and may include products from one or more merchants. Forexample, a facility may be a single store operated by one merchant, achain of two or more stores operated by one entity, or may be acollection of stores covering multiple merchants.

Again, the interruption condition may be associated with one or moreshopping facilities. Typically, such interruption conditions are limitedto one or more geographic areas (e.g., a county, a state, a region).Further, the delivery scheduling system 102 evaluates the interruptioncondition in accordance with one or more rules and relative to one ormore subsequent or future delivery days. For example, the deliveryscheduling system can identify at 11:00 PM on a Monday that forecastedand/or current weather conditions are going to exceed one or morethresholds corresponding to conditions that are expected to prevent ormake it difficult for delivery vehicles to transport products and/orroad conditions are expected to be unsafe to perform product deliverieson the next day (i.e., Tuesday in this example). As another example, thedelivery scheduling system can identify at 1:00 AM on a Thursday thatforecasted road conditions are expected to have a predefinedrelationship with one or more thresholds corresponding to the roadsexpected to be unsafe to perform product deliveries scheduled for thesubsequent business day (i.e., during the day on Thursday in thisexample). Again, in some instances, the applied rules may result thatare inconsistent with many other delivery services, and can furtherprovide a greater degree of caution over other delivery services becausethe delivery control system 100 provides for the improved subsequentreserving of delivery times for those customers that have had theirdeliveries interrupted.

When the delivery scheduling system 102 identifies an interruptioncondition that is going to adversely affect the delivery of some or allof the products during a scheduled day. The delivery scheduling system102 can notify the cancellation system 104 providing a geographic areain which the interruption condition exists. The cancellation system 104is configured to access one or more scheduled delivery databases thatmaintain delivery information for multiple different scheduleddeliveries, and apply one or more rules of a set of cancellation rulesand process scheduled deliveries relative to the geographic area toidentify multiple scheduled product deliveries that are scheduled to bedelivered from the one or more retail shopping facilities on thescheduled delivery day (or during a part of the day). The scheduleddelivery database can be maintained and/or updated by the productordering system 114 in response to receiving an order, the deliveryscheduling system 102 in organizing and scheduling deliveries based onthe different orders, and/or other systems. Further, the scheduleddelivery database maintains information about products to be deliveredand may further include customer information and/or corresponding linksto relevant customer information in one or more customer databases,which can store customer identifying information, one or more deliveryaddresses, payment methods, delivery preferences, and/or other suchinformation.

In some embodiments, the cancellation system 104 is further configuredto halt or interrupt the identified scheduled product deliveries as aresult of the interruption condition. In some instances, thecancellation system 104 and/or the delivery scheduling system 102notifies the time reserving system 108, one or more other components ofthe delivery control system 100 and/or other entities outside of thesystem that one or more days or a portion of one or more days isdesignated as an interruption condition day or portion of a day.Further, the cancellation system 104 identifies a customer associatedwith each of the interrupted product deliveries, and provides customeridentifying information to the communication system 106.

The communication system 106 is further configured to access customerinformation to identify one or more methods of communication by whicheach respective customer prefers to receive communications regardingtheir deliveries and/or product orders. The communication system, insome embodiments, includes one or more control circuits and/or systemscommunicatively coupled with multiple communication transceivers eachconfigured to communication in accordance with one or more communicationmethods (e.g., Internet, Wi-Fi, cellular, land-line telephone, RF,and/or other such methods). In some instances, for example, customersmay prefer to receive communications as a text message, an alert througha shopping facility software application (APP) implemented on theircustomer computing device 130 (e.g., smartphone, tablet, smart wearabledevice (e.g., smart watch, smart glasses, etc.), worker devices (e.g.,bar code scanner system, RFID tag reader, etc.) and the like), email,phone call, and/or other such methods of communication. Based on theidentified preferred method of communication, the communication system106 implements a notification to be communicated to the customerregarding the interrupted scheduled product delivery. In someembodiments, delivery scheduling system 102 directs the communicationsystem to communicate the notification, while in other instances thecommunication system notifies the delivery scheduling system of thepreferred method of communication and the delivery scheduling systeminitiates the communication of the notification. In someimplementations, the communication system includes one or more textmessaging systems, email services and/or accounts, directs a web serverto modify a web page, and/or other such systems.

Based on the interruption condition, the time reserving system 108 isconfigured to apply one or more rules of a set of time reserving rulesto identify one or more subsequent non-interrupted delivery days orportions of such days that occur in time after the interrupted deliveryday and that are forecasted to not be an interrupted delivery day suchthat deliveries are expected to be performed during those days orportions of those days. For example, if Tuesday is identified as aninterrupted delivery day based on weather conditions, Wednesday may beidentified as a subsequent non-interrupted delivery day when it isforecasted that Wednesday will not be an interrupted delivery day (e.g.,forecasted weather conditions are within one or more threshold levelssuch that deliveries are expected to commence on Wednesday). The timereserving system 108 further reserves at least a portion of theidentified subsequent non-interrupted delivery day to be available toallow customers associated with halted product deliveries to reschedulethe halted product deliveries. Again, the time reserving system 108operates different than other delivery services in that the reservingsystem limits and/or prioritizes subsequent times to be available tothose customers that have had deliveries interrupted, while stillmaintaining some times for other customers that have not had deliveriesinterrupted. As such, the reserving system improves customersatisfaction while enhancing delivery capabilities.

Again, in some embodiments, the delivery scheduling system 102, thecommunication system, the time reserving system 108,the product orderingsystem or other customer service system, causes a notification to becommunicated to a customer associated with each of the multiple haltedproduct deliveries, and provides access through the delivery schedulingsystem 102 to a delivery schedule that identifies available times thatcan be reserved or selected by the customer in rescheduling the haltedproduct delivery. The notification that a customer's delivery has beenhalted can be through a text message, an email, an alert providedthrough a software application (APP) on a customer's electronic device130 (e.g., smartphone, tablet, laptop, computer, etc.), an alertprovided through a webpage associated with the retail shopping facility,a telephone call, other such communication methods, or combination oftwo or more of such communication methods. In some instances, somecustomers may receive multiple notifications (e.g., a text message, anda notification through an APP).

In some embodiments, the time reserving system further blocks at leastthe reserved portion of at least one subsequent non-interrupted deliveryday and prevents other customers that are trying to schedule previouslyunscheduled deliveries from the shopping facility from being scheduledduring the reserved portion of the subsequent non-interrupted deliveryday. By blocking the reserved period, the reserved period is maintainedto be available to service those customers that had their deliveriesinterrupted. The time reserving system 108 and/or the deliveryscheduling system 102 may subsequently open some or all of the reservedportion of the subsequent non-interrupted delivery day after one or morethreshold number of customers whose deliveries were interrupted haverescheduled for the subsequent non-interrupted delivery day or anotherday, or cancelled their delivery. In some embodiments, customers areprovided access to a user interface that allows the customer to seeavailable times and select a desired delivery time. The interface may beprovided as part of the notification of the halted delivery, accessedthrough an APP, accessed through a web page link that is supplied in anotification (e.g., in a text or email), accessed through a web pageassociated with the shopping facility, or the like.

Based on a communication from a customer, the delivery scheduling system102 reschedules a delivery of at least the halted product deliveryduring the reserved portion of the subsequent non-interrupted deliveryday or another day as requested by the user. In some embodiments, thedelivery scheduling system applies one or more scheduling rules toconfirm the requested delivery time is still available and/or isconsistent with one or more limiting factors such as, but not limitedto, whether the delivery location is within a threshold distance of oneor more other scheduled deliveries scheduled before or after therequested time, quantities of delivery vehicles, quantities of productsto be delivered, expected delivery routes, and/or other such factors.

In some instances, the communication from the customer requesting arescheduled delivery time and/or location is received through a userinterface of an APP, a user interface accessed through a web page,communicated over the telephone between the customer and a shoppingfacility representative, or other such communication. The deliveryscheduling system can confirm an identification of the customer, confirmthe halted delivery is associated with the customer, and allow thecustomer to reschedule (e.g., select from one or more available deliverytimes). In some implementations, the customer may be allowed to modifythrough the rendered user interface the products being delivered byadding and/or removing one or more products. For example, the userinterface may provide the customer with an option to modify the productorder, which can in some instances provide a listing of the products toallow the customer to select one or more products to be removed from thedelivery, and/or provide an option to access information about otheravailable products that may be added to the delivery (e.g., through ashopping interface website of the shopping facility, which may receiveinformation from the inventory system). In some instances, the customeris routed to the product ordering system 114 when the customer wants tomodify the delivery, and the product ordering system 114 can obtain themodifications and adjust delivery orders. Selected products can be addedto the rescheduled delivery, and in some instances, workers are notifiedof the modification so that previously picked products corresponding tothe halted delivery can be modified to remove one or more productsand/or add one or more products.

In some embodiments, the delivery control system 100 may attempt tooptimize deliveries and/or improve customer service. Often, whendeliveries have to be halted and rescheduled to one or more subsequentnon-interrupted days, the number of deliveries to be performed on thesubsequent non-interrupted delivery day is greater than a typical daybecause of the deliveries that were already scheduled for thenon-interrupted delivery day prior to the interruption condition.Accordingly, in some instances, the delivery scheduling system mayattempt to optimize deliveries by highlighting and/or restrictingrescheduling times when one or more deliveries are already scheduled orhave been rescheduled that are within threshold distances of thecustomer rescheduling, within a threshold distance between a routebetween two already scheduled and/or rescheduled deliveries, and thelike. The delivery scheduling system may, in response to a notificationof a particular customer initiating a rescheduling process, evaluatecurrently scheduled and rescheduled deliveries relative to a deliverylocation of the particular customer in identifying optimal deliverytimes and/or restricting times that the customer may selected and/or beprovided as an option from which to select.

Similarly, some embodiments in allowing customers to reschedule thehalted deliveries may limit the available rescheduling times based onthe customer's specified delivery location. In some instances, forexample, the delivery scheduling system may apply one or more schedulingrules to divide a geographic area or areas into two or more zones, andlimit available rescheduled delivery times based on these zones. Theserules provide scheduling that is different than other previous deliverysystems because the rules take into consideration previously scheduleddeliveries, and in many instances with rescheduling accommodates theneed to increase the number of deliveries that can be accommodated whileprioritizing customers that have had deliveries interrupted. Forexample, the delivery scheduling system may apply one or more rules todefine multiple different geographic delivery zones and assign one ormore limited delivery periods of time to one or more of the geographicdelivery zones. The number and/or duration of these limited period oftime can be dependent on relative sizes of zones, numbers of products tobe delivered in each zone, zone priorities, types of products to bedelivered to the different zones, number and/or type of deliveryvehicles available, and/or other such factors. In some instances, forexample, a delivery location that is within a first zone may be islimited to a first period of time (e.g., between 9:00 am-11:30 am),while a delivery location that is within a second zone may be limited toa second and third period of time (e.g., 12:00-2:00 pm and 4:00-6:00pm). In some embodiments, the delivery scheduling system identifies adelivery location associated with a customer, and limits delivery timesavailable to that customer in rescheduling the delivery of the haltedproduct delivery to a sub-portion of the reserved portion of thesubsequent non-interrupted delivery day as a function of the deliverylocation. This can allow the delivery scheduling system to concentratethe rescheduled deliveries based on geographic areas, pre-establisheddelivery routes, optimize delivery routes, and/or the like. Similarly,by limiting available rescheduling times the system can in part controldelivery timing, increase the number of products that can be delivered,increase the number of product deliveries that can be completed, andother such benefits.

As described above, some embodiments notify customers, typically whenrescheduling and/or scheduling delivery, of one or more deliveriesand/or delivery times previously scheduled for a delivery near acustomer's delivery location. In some implementations, the deliveryscheduling system can identify when a customer's delivery location iswithin one or more threshold distances from a location of one or morepreviously scheduled or rescheduled delivery times, within a thresholddistance of a pre-established or predicted delivery route, or the like.The customer can be notified of one or more delivery times thatcorrespond to another delivery previously scheduled for a seconddelivery location that is within a threshold distance of the customers'delivery location. In some instances, the customer is provided a userinterface that lists available delivery times that correspond withdelivery times that are within a threshold distance from the customer'sdelivery location. The delivery times can be dependent on the distancebetween the delivery location and the other delivery location, expectedtravel times, quantities of products to deliver, and/or other suchfactors.

Further, some embodiments may present one or more incentives to thecustomers encourage them to select a delivery time that corresponds witha delivery already scheduled that is within the threshold distance fromthe customer's delivery location (e.g., free delivery, coupons, discounton subsequent delivery, other such incentives, or a combination of twoor more of such incentives). For example, the delivery scheduling system102 and/or the delivery routing system 112 may detect that a customerthat is rescheduling a halted delivery is with a threshold distance ofanother scheduled delivery, a scheduled delivery route, etc., and caninclude in the user interface accessed by a customer in rescheduling ahalted delivery an indication (e.g., a displayed green leaf, a banner, apop-up, or the like) that there is already a scheduled delivery near thecustomer's delivery location. Further, the notice or indicator mayfurther display potential incentives and/or one or more incentives maybe displayed when the customer activates an option (e.g., selects the“green leaf” indicator). The rescheduling may be through a notificationof halted deliveries. A notification can be communicated by thecommunication system 106 to a customer associated with each of themultiple halted product deliveries, and provided with access to aschedule identifying available times for rescheduling the halted productdelivery.

As described above, the time reserving system 108 can reserve at least aportion of one or more subsequent non-interrupted delivery periodsand/or days to be available for rescheduling halted deliveries.Typically, however, one or more deliveries to be delivered during thosesubsequent non-interrupted days were previously scheduled prior to theexistence of the interruption condition and the halting of thedeliveries. As such, the time reserving system 108 typically reservesportions of time and the delivery scheduling control circuit inrescheduling the delivery of halted product delivery typicallyreschedules the delivery of the halted product deliveries withoutadversely affecting previously scheduled product deliveries that arescheduled for the subsequent non-interrupted delivery day and that werescheduled prior to the identifying that the delivery interruptioncondition existed. In some instances, the delivery scheduling system 102can identify the customers associated with existing scheduled deliverieson the subsequent non-interrupted delivery day and may direct thecommunication through the communication system 106 in attempts toincentivize those customers to modify their delivery time and/or day(e.g., to shift to be consistent with a rescheduled delivery time whenwithin a threshold distance). In some embodiments, the deliveryscheduling system 102 applies one or more rescheduling rules to identifypotential customers with existing scheduled deliveries during subsequentnon-interrupted days. The delivery scheduling system can evaluate thetypes of products scheduled for delivery, a customer's likelywillingness to allow for rescheduling, a customer's likelihood of beingincentivized to reschedule, and the like. Further, the deliveryscheduling system can estimate the number of rescheduled deliveriesattempted to be reserved in the subsequent non-interrupted days (e.g.,based on historic rescheduling, customers' demands, types of products,etc.), in attempts to determine whether and how many existing reserveddeliveries during the one or more non-interrupted days that would bebeneficial to reschedule. The application of these rules and/orconsiderations is inconsistent with other delivery services, at least inpart, because other delivery services fail to identify those customersthat can more easily absorb rescheduling and/or that are more likely tobe incentivized.

In some embodiments, the time reserving system 108 determines an amountof one or more subsequent non-interrupted delivery days and/or a numberof subsequent non-interrupted delivery days that is to be reserved toreschedule the halted product deliveries. In some implementations, thetime reserving system applies one or more time reserving rules toevaluate historic data in predicting a number of halted deliveries thatare likely to be rescheduled. For example, the historic data can be usedto determine an average, mean, percentage, average percentage, and/orother relevant parameters corresponding to the historic number ofcustomers that reschedule halted product deliveries. This evaluation mayfurther take into consideration other historic factors, such as thenumber of halted deliveries, types of interruption events, the number ofdays of interruption, time of year of an interrupted event, types ofproducts ordered for those deliveries that were interrupted, types ofproducts ordered for those deliveries that have not yet been or were notrescheduled, and other such relevant information. Further, the deliveryscheduling system can evaluate these parameters relative to the numberof the multiple halted product deliveries in the current interruptionevent. For example, the system may evaluate historic product demand ofone or more products prior to and/or following one or more similar typesof event that correspond to the interruption event. Further, the timereserving system may identify types of products likely to be in moredemand based on the type of interruption event, and give greater weightto those interrupted deliveries that include those products as morelikely to be rescheduled as soon as possible.

Some embodiments take into consideration the ability of the shoppingfacility to prepare products for delivery on the one or more subsequentnon-interrupted days following the interruption event. In someembodiments, the delivery scheduling system 102 and/or the productpicking scheduling system 116 in cooperation with the delivery routingsystem 112 can evaluate a state of preparation of products for eachdelivery scheduled for a subsequent non-interrupted delivery day indetermining whether to modify delivery routes and/or deliveryscheduling. In some implementations, delivery routes may be defined tobe shorter than typical delivery routes so that less product orders haveto be picked and loaded into a delivery vehicle before it can leave toimplement the delivery route. Further, the shorter delivery routes allowworkers at the shopping facility to continue picking remaining deliveryorders while the delivery vehicle is implementing the shortened deliveryroute. In many instances, workers at the shopping facility may pick theproducts for each of the halted deliveries prior to or after theinterruption condition exists and/or is identified. For example, whenthe interruption condition is defined at 3:00 AM on a Tuesday, workersmay already be at the shopping facility and performing the picking forthe deliveries that are being halted on that Tuesday. As such,additional picking on Wednesday would not have to be performed toprepare for the deliveries on the subsequent non-interrupted deliveryday (i.e., Wednesday in this example). However, the interruption eventmay be been defined at 8:00 PM on Monday, and workers may be unable tosafely get to the shopping facility to perform the picking for thescheduled Tuesday deliveries. As such, additional picking will be neededto prepare for the previously scheduled deliveries and the rescheduleddeliveries of the subsequent non-interrupted delivery day. Because ofthe additional picking requirements and/or the ability of workers to beavailable to perform the picking, all of the delivery orders may not befully picked and ready to be loaded onto a delivery vehicle.

The product picking scheduling system 116 and/or delivery schedulingsystem 102 can, in some applications, attempt to compensate for theincomplete picking by limiting orders to be routed and directing thedelivery routing system 112 to modify delivery routes and the number ofdeliveries to be performed prior to the delivery vehicle returning tothe shopping facility. Often, on days when a previous day was notinterrupted, delivery vehicles are each loaded with all of the productsscheduled to be delivered by that delivery vehicle for that day, and thedelivery vehicles may not return to the shopping facility until they arefinished with their deliveries for the day. However, when the productorders have not been fully picked and prepared to be loaded, thedelivery vehicles would have to wait until the orders are fully picked.Alternatively, some embodiments modify the delivery routes of one ormore delivery vehicles to define multiple sub-routes with the deliveryvehicle returning to the shopping facility between the sub-routes. Thisallows workers at the shopping facility to continue picking deliveryorders that are intended for a subsequent sub-route of one or moredelivery vehicles.

In some embodiments, the product picking scheduling system 116 and/ordelivery scheduling system 102 can identify that at least a thresholdquantity of product deliveries and/or products, which are to be pickedat the shopping facility for at least the multiple halted productdeliveries, are yet to be picked and/or are not prepared to be loadedonto a delivery vehicle by a threshold period of time prior to ascheduled departure of the delivery vehicle on the subsequentnon-interrupted delivery day of one or more delivery vehicles.Typically, the delivery scheduling system 102 further considers otherpreviously scheduled deliveries that were scheduled for delivery on thesubsequent non-interrupted day prior to blocking further deliveryreservations, and whether a threshold quantities of these productdeliveries have additionally been picked and/or are ready to be loadedwithin the threshold period of time. The threshold quantities of productdeliveries may vary depending on one or more factors such as but notlimited to the threshold period of time, expected pick rates, number ofworkers performing the picking, number of workers available to performthe picking, quantity of delivery orders, quantity of products in eachof the delivery orders, total quantity of products remaining to bepicked, types of products to be picked, locations within the shoppingfacility from where products are to be pick, other such parameters, andtypically a combination of two or more of such parameters. In someinstances, the threshold quantities of product deliveries may be all ofthe product deliveries scheduled to be delivered on the subsequentnon-interrupted delivery day, which again may be dependent on thethreshold time.

Instructions can be issued to define a set of picking schedules that atleast one worker is to sequentially follow in picking products to bedelivered according to at least the halted product deliveries, andtypically all delivery orders for the subsequent non-interrupted day.The delivery scheduling system 102 and/or delivery routing system 112can identify a portion of the product deliveries scheduled for thenon-interrupted delivery day that are to be grouped and delivered beforereturning to the shopping facility to retrieve additional products to bedelivered, and issue instructions that cause one or more pickingschedules to direct an appropriate order for one or more workers tofollow in collecting those products.

One or more further groupings of deliveries can be defined andcorresponding picking schedules generated to direct the pickingaccording to those further groupings. For example, a set of deliveriesscheduled for the non-interrupted delivery day that are to be deliveredby a first delivery vehicle can be divided into a set of threegroupings, and a set of picking schedules can direct one or more workersto first pick products for a first group of the deliveries. Once thoseproducts are collected and/or loaded onto the delivery vehicle, theworkers can then pick products for a second group of the deliverieswhile the first delivery vehicle is delivering the first group of thedeliveries. Similarly, once the products corresponding to the secondgroup of the deliveries are picked and/or loaded, the one or moreworkers can use one or more of the set of picking schedules to pickproducts for a third group of the deliveries. Accordingly, the pickingis grouped to allow one or more delivery vehicles to start thedeliveries even when all of the products to be delivered by that vehiclefor the day have not been picked.

Further, the set of picking schedules allows the workers to continue topick products while the delivery vehicles are delivering products, andto load those onto the vehicles when the delivery vehicles returnsbetween groups of deliveries. The delivery vehicles 128 can communicatestatus information, location information and other such information tothe delivery scheduling system 102 to allow the delivery schedulingsystem to track the delivery vehicles and coordinate workers at theshopping facility to prepare a subsequent load based on an expectedreturn of the delivery vehicle. The communication with the deliveryvehicles may be through a GPS system of the vehicle, a navigation systemof the delivery vehicle, and/or other components of the deliveryvehicle. Additionally or alternatively, the delivery scheduling systemmay communicate with a driver's smart phone, tablet, customer electronicdevice (e.g., device that can scan products and/or totes) or other suchuser interface unit, such as through an APP, text message, tracking GPScoordinates, a text or call from the driver, other such communication,or combination of two or more of such communications.

Often when workers are picking products, the picked products are groupedor organized according to a particular order for each differentcustomer. The products can be placed in one or more totes, boxes, bagsor the like, and labeled to identify the totes, bags, boxes, etc. arepart of the same order. In some instances, each order for a particularday is identified with a serial number. Often these numbers may bereused on subsequent days. As such, when there is an interruptioncondition, there may be some confusion as to whether a tote is part of ahalted delivery, or a delivery that was previously scheduled for thenon-interrupted delivery day. As such, some embodiments further directworkers to apply a labeling to distinguish between products and/or totes(or boxes, bags, etc.) that part of an interrupted delivery, from thosepreviously scheduled for the non-interrupted delivery day. For example,a “Y” indicator or other distinction (e.g., colored sticker, additionalnumbering, etc.) can be added to those totes associated with halteddeliveries. In other instances, the delivery scheduling system and/orthe picking system may, in response to the interruption condition, causethe serial numbering to not repeat but instead continue so that thereare not duplicates.

Further instructions can be issued to cause a set of sub-delivery routesto be defined that each correspond to one of the picking schedules suchthat one or more worker pick products specified in a subsequent secondone of the picking schedules while the first delivery vehicle isdelivering products picked based on a previous first picking schedule.In some embodiments, the instructions to define the set of sub-deliveryroutes further instruct that the set of sub-delivery routes compriserouting to cause the first delivery vehicle to return to the shoppingfacility upon completing a plurality of the set of shortened deliveryroutes to be loaded with the products picked based on a subsequent oneof the set of picking schedules (e.g., return to the shopping facilityto be loaded after each but the last sub-delivery route). In someembodiments, the instructions are communicated to the delivery routingsystem that evaluates the delivery locations, determines routing foreach of the sub-delivery routes that correspond to one of multiplegroups of deliveries. The grouping may be based on scheduled time ofdelivery, location, and/or other factors. For example, the deliveryrouting system may group those deliveries scheduled between 8:00 AM and10:00 AM; group deliveries scheduled between 10:00 AM and 12:00 PM;group deliveries scheduled between 12:00 PM and 2:00 PM; group thedeliveries scheduled between 2:00 PM and 4:00 PM; and group thedeliveries scheduled after 4:00 PM. This allows workers untilapproximate 4:00 (or the time the delivery vehicle is scheduled to leaveto deliver the deliveries scheduled after 4:00 PM) to pick the productsfor the deliveries scheduled after 4:00 PM, while still allowing earlierdeliveries to occur. As such, the sub-delivery routes are, in at leastsome instances, shortened routes that include less deliveries than atypical days deliveries, and typically include a sub-set of the totaldeliveries that a delivery truck is to perform. Sub-delivery routes canbe defined for one or more delivery vehicles for a given delivery day.

In some embodiments, the delivery scheduling system maintains ascheduled delivery database that includes information about scheduleddeliveries, such as one or more of order number, products, customeridentification, delivery location, delivery route, reserved deliverytimes, whether the delivery was previously interrupted, a priority ofthe delivery, and/or other such information. Further, in some instances,the delivery scheduling system 102 maintains a completed transactiondatabase that maintains information amount deliveries that have beencompleted, and/or the schedule delivery database includes one or morefields corresponding to a delivery completion. The delivery vehicle 128and/or a user computing device 130 of the delivery worker cancommunicate one or more notifications of a completion of the deliverythat is forwarded to the delivery scheduling system. The deliveryscheduling system can maintain the completed transactions in thedatabase, and further notify the product ordering system 114 and/or apayment system to complete the transaction and charge the customer forthe purchase. As such, the system avoids charging customers for aproduct prior to the customer receiving the product.

In some embodiments, the delivery scheduling system 102 communicateswith geographically distributed user devices 130 of customers that havehad their deliveries interrupted and/or customers that have deliveriesscheduled on subsequent non-interrupted days to acquire informationabout the customers and their availability for rescheduling. In someinstances, the user devices 130 implement an APP that can accesscalendar data, parse internet searches, parse internet sites visited,obtain location information, and/or other such information. Some or allof this collected information can be communicated to the deliveryscheduling system to be evaluated by the delivery scheduling system indetermining and/or limiting potential times for rescheduling deliveries.One or more rescheduling rules can be applied to evaluate calendar datato identify potential times when a customer is available and/orunavailable. According to these determined availabilities and/orunavailabilities, the delivery scheduling system can limit those timespresented to the customer for rescheduling an interrupted delivery.Similarly, location data may be used to identify that a customer is outof town or a threshold distance from a typical delivery location. Basedon this information, the delivery scheduling system can limit the timesfor rescheduling and/or may direct the communication system to inquirewith the customer regarding potentially cancelling the order orrescheduling when the customer is expected to be back (e.g., based oncalendar data).

In some embodiments, the user devices 130 may include one or moreso-called Internet of Things (IOT) (such as smart phones, tablets, smartTVs, computers, laptops, and so forth). In some instances, the Internetof Things may include network edge elements (i.e., network elementsdeployed at the edge of a network) and other systems such as but notlimited to wearable or carriable devices, vehicles, buildings, and otheritems that are embedded with electronics, software, sensors, networkconnectivity, and sometimes actuators that enable these objects tocollect and exchange data via the Internet. The Internet of Thingsallows people and objects pertaining to people to be sensed andcorresponding information to be transferred to remote locations viaintervening network infrastructure (e.g., network 126). In some case anetwork edge element is configured to be personally carried by a person.Examples include but are not limited to so-called smart phones, tablets,smart wearable devices (e.g., smart watches, fitness monitors that areworn on the body, etc.). In other cases, the network edge element may beconfigured to not be personally carried by a person, such as but notlimited to smart refrigerators and pantries, entertainment andinformation platforms, exercise and sporting equipment, digital personalassistant (e.g., home and/or office digital assistances such as AmazonAlexa implemented on an Amazon Echo, Google Assistant implemented on aGoogle Home, etc.), and other such devices. This can occur when, forexample, the network edge element is too large and/or too heavy to bereasonably carried by an ordinary average person, or not configured toeasy transport. This can also occur when, for example, the network edgeelement has operating requirements ill-suited to the mobile environmentthat typifies the average person.

Some embodiments further evaluate peoples' actions, intentions andhistory in estimating and/or limiting period of time for rescheduling aninterrupted delivery. Data may be received from numerous user devices130 that identify corresponding individual's actions, intentions,history data, and the like. The data may include calendar data, socialmedia, Internet search parameters, on-line and retail store shoppingand/or purchases, and other such data may be detected by one or moreInternet of Things. Such data can be communicated to the deliveryscheduling system 102 and/or at least partially locally processed on theInternet of Things to identify a corresponding person's actions,intentions, and locations relative to rescheduling. Based on thisinformation, one or more rules may be applied in evaluating potentialrescheduling times relevant to a geographic area. For example, the rulesmay evaluate current and/or forecasted location, appointments, calendarevents, and/or other such information.

Further, in some embodiments, the delivery scheduling system 102communicates with an inventory system 118 associated with the shoppingfacility from which one or more products are scheduled to be obtainedfor an interrupted delivery. the delivery scheduling system can obtaininventory data for one or more products to be delivered and utilized indetermining available rescheduling times. In instances, one or moreproducts may no longer be available and/or shipment to the retailfacility may have been interrupted and thus may not be available and/ornot available for an expected period of time (e.g., until a subsequentshipment is received). One or more rules can be applied to evaluateexpected sales and/or distribution of the product, available quantities,expected shipments, pending orders, and/or other such factors. Theinventory system may maintain and/or access one or more inventorydatabases maintaining information about products available, expectedshipments, sales rates, movement rates, and/or other such information.

FIG. 2 illustrates a simplified block diagram of an exemplary process200 of controlling product deliveries, in accordance with someembodiments. In step 202, it is identified, corresponding to one or moreretail shopping facilities, that a delivery interruption conditionexists for at least a subsequent delivery day. In step 204, multiplescheduled product deliveries are identified that are scheduled to bedelivered from the one or more retail shopping facilities on theinterrupted delivery day, and that are to be halted as a result of theinterruption condition.

In step 206, a subsequent non-interrupted delivery day is identifiedthat occurs in time after the interrupted delivery day. In step 208, atleast a portion of the non-interrupted delivery day is reserved to beavailable to allow customers associated with halted product deliveriesto reschedule the halted product deliveries. Further, some embodimentsblocks the reserved portion of the non-interrupted delivery day andprevent previously unscheduled deliveries from the one or more shoppingfacilities from being scheduled during the reserved portion of thenon-interrupted delivery day. In step 210, the delivery of one or moreof the halted product deliveries are rescheduled during the reservedportion of the non-interrupted delivery day based on communication froma customer corresponding to each of the one or more rescheduleddeliveries.

Some embodiments identify first delivery location associated with acustomer, and limit delivery times available to the customer inrescheduling the delivery of the halted product delivery to asub-portion of the reserved portion of the non-interrupted delivery dayas a function of the delivery location. In some implementations, acustomer may be notified of a delivery time of another deliverypreviously scheduled for another delivery location that is within athreshold distance of the customer's delivery location. For example, thecustomer may be notified while the system 100 is receiving therescheduling of the halted product delivery.

In some embodiments, the system causes a notification to be communicatedto a customer associated with each of multiple halted productdeliveries, and provides access to a schedule that identifies availabletimes that can be reserved in rescheduling a corresponding one of thehalted product deliveries. Some embodiments, in rescheduling thedeliveries of one or more halted product deliveries reschedules haltedproduct deliveries without adversely affecting previously scheduledproduct deliveries that are scheduled for the non-interrupted deliveryday and were scheduled prior to identifying that the deliveryinterruption condition existed. In some instances, this can includeavoid cancelling, delaying and/or rescheduling previously scheduleddeliveries.

In reserving a portion of the subsequent non-interrupted delivery day tobe available to allow customers to reschedule their halted productdeliveries, some embodiments determine an amount of the non-interrupteddelivery day to be reserved as a function of historic numbers ofcustomers that reschedule halted product deliveries and the number ofthe multiple halted product deliveries. In some embodiments, the systemidentifies that at least a threshold quantity of product deliveries, tobe picked at a shopping facility for multiple halted product deliveries,are yet to be picked by a threshold period of time prior to a scheduleddeparture on the non-interrupted delivery day of one or more deliveryvehicles. Instructions can be issued to define a set of pickingschedules that at least one worker is to sequentially follow in pickingproducts to be delivered according to the halted product deliveries. Insome instances, each picking schedule of the set of the pickingschedules directs the picking of products for a portion of the productsto be delivered on the subsequent non-interrupted delivery day. Someembodiments may further issue instructions to define a set ofsub-delivery routes that each correspond to one of the picking schedulessuch that the at least one worker picks products specified in asubsequent second one of the picking schedules while a delivery vehicleis delivering products picked based on a previous first pickingschedule. In some applications, the instructions can includeinstructions that the set of sub-delivery routes comprise routing tocause a delivery vehicle to return to the shopping facility uponcompleting each of a plurality of the set of sub-delivery routes to beloaded with the products picked based on a subsequent one of the set ofpicking schedules.

FIG. 3 illustrates an exemplary system 300 that may be used forimplementing any of the components, circuits, circuitry, systems,functionality, apparatuses, process, or device of the system 100 of FIG.1 and/or mentioned above or below, or parts of such circuit, circuitry,functionality, systems, apparatuses, processes, or devices, inaccordance with some embodiments. For example, the system 300 may beused to implement the delivery scheduling system 102, cancellationsystem 104, communication system 106, time reserving system 108,delivery routing system 112, product ordering system 114, productpicking scheduling system 116, inventory system 118, and/or other suchcomponents, circuitry, functionality and/or devices. However, the use ofthe system 300 or any portion thereof is certainly not required.Further, one or more of the above described systems may be cooperativelyimplemented through a single system 300.

By way of example, the system 300 may comprise a control circuit orprocessor module 312, memory 314, and one or more communication links,paths, buses or the like 318. Some embodiments may include one or moreuser interfaces 316, and/or one or more internal and/or external powersources or supplies 340. The control circuit 312 can be implementedthrough one or more processors, microprocessors, central processingunit, logic, local digital storage, firmware, software, and/or othercontrol hardware and/or software, and may be used to execute or assistin executing the steps of the processes, methods, functionality andtechniques described herein, and control various communications,decisions, programs, content, listings, services, interfaces, logging,reporting, etc. Further, in some embodiments, the control circuit 312can be part of control circuitry and/or a control system 310, which maybe implemented through one or more processors with access to one or morememory 314 that can store code that is implemented by the controlcircuit and/or processors to implement intended functionality. In someapplications, the control circuit and/or memory may be distributed overa communications network (e.g., LAN, WAN, Internet) providingdistributed and/or redundant processing and functionality. Again, thesystem 300 may be used to implement one or more of the above or below,or parts of, components, circuits, systems, process and the like. Forexample, the system may implement the delivery scheduling system 102with the control circuit being a selection delivery scheduling controlcircuit, the cancellation system 104 with the control circuit being acancellation system control circuit, the communication system 106 withthe control circuit being a communication system control circuit, thetime reserving system 108 with the control circuit being a timereserving control circuit, the delivery routing system 112 with thecontrol circuit being a routing control circuit, the product orderingsystem 114 with the control circuit being a product ordering controlcircuit, the product picking scheduling system 116 with the controlcircuit being a picking scheduling control circuit, the inventory system118 with the control circuit being an inventor system control circuit,the user devices with the control circuit being a user device controlcircuit, or other components.

The user interface 316 can allow a user to interact with the system 300and receive information through the system. In some instances, the userinterface 316 includes a display 322 and/or one or more user inputs 324,such as a buttons, touch screen, track ball, keyboard, mouse, etc.,which can be part of or wired or wirelessly coupled with the system 300.Typically, the system 300 further includes one or more communicationinterfaces, ports, transceivers 320 and the like allowing the system 300to communicate over a communication bus, a distributed computer and/orcommunication network 126 (e.g., a local area network (LAN), theInternet, wide area network (WAN), etc.), communication link 318, othernetworks or communication channels with other devices and/or other suchcommunications or combinations thereof. Further the one or moretransceivers 320 can include transceivers configured for wired,wireless, optical, fiber optical cable, satellite, or other suchcommunication configurations or combinations of two or more of suchcommunications. Some embodiments include one or more input/output (I/O)ports 334 that allow one or more devices to couple with the system 300.The I/O ports can be substantially any relevant port or combinations ofports, such as but not limited to USB, Ethernet, or other such ports.

The system 300 comprises an example of a control and/or processor-basedsystem with the control circuit 312. Again, the control circuit 312 canbe implemented through one or more processors, controllers, centralprocessing units, logic, software and the like. Further, in someimplementations the control circuit 312 may provide multiprocessorfunctionality.

The memory 314, which can be accessed by the control circuit 312,typically includes one or more processor readable and/or computerreadable media accessed by at least the control circuit 312, and caninclude volatile and/or nonvolatile media, such as RAM, ROM, EEPROM,flash memory and/or other memory technology. Further, the memory 314 isshown as internal to the control system 310; however, the memory 314 canbe internal, external or a combination of internal and external memory.Similarly, some or all of the memory 314 can be internal, external or acombination of internal and external memory of the control circuit 312.The external memory can be substantially any relevant memory such as,but not limited to, solid-state storage devices or drives, hard drive,universal serial bus (USB) stick or drive, flash memory secure digital(SD) card, other memory cards, and other such memory or combinations oftwo or more of such memory. The memory 314 can store code, software,executables, scripts, data, content, lists, programming, programs, logor history data, user information and the like. While FIG. 3 illustratesthe various components being coupled together via a bus, it isunderstood that the various components may actually be coupled to thecontrol circuit and/or one or more other components directly.

Some embodiments include the I/O interface 334 that allows wired and/orwireless communication coupling of to external components, such as withone or more delivery scheduling systems, delivery routing systems,product ordering systems, product picking scheduling systems, inventorysystems, databases, third party services, and other such devices orsystems. Typically, the I/O interface provides wired communicationand/or wireless communication (e.g., Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, cellular, RF,and/or other such wireless communication), and in some instances mayinclude any known wired and/or wireless interfacing device, circuitand/or connecting device, such as but not limited to one or moretransmitters, receivers, transceivers, or combination of two or more ofsuch devices.

In some embodiments, brick and mortar retail facilities have a deliverycontrol system to control product deliveries based on an interruptioncondition, and comprises: a delivery scheduling system; a cancellationsystem communicatively coupled with the delivery scheduling system, andconfigured to identify schedules deliveries; and a time reserving systemcommunicatively coupled with at least the delivery scheduling system;wherein the delivery scheduling system comprises a delivery schedulingcontrol circuit configured identify, corresponding to a first retailshopping facility, that a delivery interruption condition exists for atleast a subsequent first delivery day, wherein the interruptioncondition comprises a condition that makes it unsafe to perform productdeliveries on the first delivery day; wherein the cancellation system isconfigured to identify multiple scheduled product deliveries, scheduledto be delivered from the first retail shopping facility on the firstdelivery day, that are to be halted as a result of the interruptioncondition; wherein the time reserving system is configured to: receivenotification of the interruption of the first delivery day and apply oneor more time reserving rules to identify a non-interrupted seconddelivery day that occurs in time after the first delivery day; andreserve at least a portion of the second delivery day to be available toallow customers associated with halted product deliveries to reschedulethe halted product deliveries, and block the reserved portion of thesecond delivery day and prevent previously unscheduled deliveriesassociated with the first shopping facility from being scheduled duringthe reserved portion of the second delivery day; and wherein thedelivery scheduling control circuit is configured to reschedule adelivery of at least a first halted product delivery during the reservedportion of the second delivery day based on communication from a firstcustomer.

Some embodiments provide systems to control product deliveries. Thesesystems include a transceiver configured to communicatively couple witha distributed computer network; a delivery scheduling control circuitcoupled with the transceiver; memory coupled to the delivery schedulingcontrol circuit and storing computer instructions that when executed bythe delivery scheduling control circuit cause the delivery schedulingcontrol circuit to: identify, corresponding to a first retail shoppingfacility, that a delivery interruption condition exists for at least asubsequent first delivery day, wherein the interruption conditioncomprises a condition that makes it unsafe to perform product deliverieson the first delivery day; identify multiple scheduled productdeliveries, scheduled to be delivered from the first retail shoppingfacility on the first delivery day, that are to be halted as a result ofthe interruption condition; identify a non-interrupted second deliveryday that occurs in time after the first delivery day; reserve at least aportion of the second delivery day to be available to allow customersassociated with halted product deliveries to reschedule the haltedproduct deliveries, and block the reserved portion of the seconddelivery day and prevent previously unscheduled deliveries associatedwith the first shopping facility from being scheduled during thereserved portion of the second delivery day; and reschedule a deliveryof at least a first halted product delivery during the reserved portionof the second delivery day based on communication from a first customer.

Further, some embodiments provide methods of controlling productdeliveries, comprising: by a delivery scheduling control circuit:identifying, corresponding to a first retail shopping facility, that adelivery interruption condition exists for at least a subsequent firstdelivery day, wherein the interruption condition comprises a conditionthat makes it unsafe to perform product deliveries on the first deliveryday; identifying multiple scheduled product deliveries, scheduled to bedelivered from the first retail shopping facility on the first deliveryday, that are to be halted as a result of the interruption condition;identifying a non-interrupted second delivery day that occurs in timeafter the first delivery day; reserving at least a portion of the seconddelivery day to be available to allow customers associated with haltedproduct deliveries to reschedule the halted product deliveries, andblock the reserved portion of the second delivery day and preventpreviously unscheduled deliveries associated with the first shoppingfacility from being scheduled during the reserved portion of the seconddelivery day; and rescheduling a delivery of at least a first haltedproduct delivery during the reserved portion of the second delivery daybased on communication from a first customer.

Those skilled in the art will recognize that a wide variety of othermodifications, alterations, and combinations can also be made withrespect to the above described embodiments without departing from thescope of the invention, and that such modifications, alterations, andcombinations are to be viewed as being within the ambit of the inventiveconcept.

What is claimed is:
 1. A delivery control system to control deliveriesbased on an interruption condition, comprising: a delivery schedulingsystem comprising a plurality of scheduling processors communicativelycoupled over a distributed network; a cancellation system comprising aplurality of cancellation processors communicatively coupled over thenetwork; and a time reserving system comprising a plurality of reservingprocessors communicatively coupled over the network, wherein the timereserving system is communicatively coupled over the network with atleast the delivery scheduling system with at least the deliveryscheduling system; wherein the delivery scheduling system comprises adelivery scheduling control circuit implemented through one or more ofthe scheduling processors, wherein the scheduling control circuit isconfigured to access and apply a set of one or more cancellation rulesto a plurality of sets of different conditions corresponding todifferent geographic areas and identify, corresponding to a first retailshopping facility, that a delivery interruption condition exists for atleast a subsequent first delivery day, wherein the interruptioncondition comprises a condition having a predefined relationship with asafety threshold; wherein the cancellation system is configured toaccess and apply one or more of the cancellation rules to identifymultiple scheduled product deliveries of the plurality of productdeliveries, scheduled to be delivered from the first retail shoppingfacility on the first delivery day, that are to be halted as a result ofthe interruption condition; wherein the time reserving system accessesand applies a set of one or more time reserving rules and is configuredto: receive notification of the interruption of the first delivery dayand apply one or more of the time reserving rules to identify anon-interrupted second delivery day that occurs in time after the firstdelivery day; and reserve at least a portion of the second delivery dayto be available to allow customers associated with halted productdeliveries to reschedule the halted product deliveries, wherein theportion of the second delivery date that is reserved is based onhistoric numbers of customers that rescheduled halted product deliveriesrelative to a corresponding number of the halted product deliveries, andblock the reserved portion of the second delivery day and preventpreviously unscheduled deliveries associated with the first shoppingfacility from being scheduled during the reserved portion of the seconddelivery day; and wherein the delivery scheduling control circuit isconfigured to reschedule a delivery of at least a first halted productdelivery during the reserved portion of the second delivery day based oncommunication from a first customer.
 2. The system of claim 1, whereinthe delivery scheduling control circuit identifies a first deliverylocation associated with the first customer, and limits delivery timesavailable to the first customer in rescheduling the delivery of thefirst halted product delivery to a sub-portion of the reserved portionof the second delivery day as a function of the first delivery location.3. The system of claim 2, wherein the delivery scheduling controlcircuit causes a notification to be communicated to first customer of adelivery time of a second delivery to a different customer that waspreviously scheduled for a second delivery location that is within athreshold distance of the first delivery location.
 4. The system ofclaim 2, further comprising: a communication system communicativelycoupled with the delivery scheduling system and configured to implementa communication of a notification to a customer associated with each ofthe multiple halted product deliveries, and provides access to aschedule that identifies available times, including available timesduring the reserve portion of the second delivery day, that can bereserved in rescheduling a corresponding one of the halted productdeliveries.
 5. The system of claim 1, wherein the delivery schedulingcontrol circuit in rescheduling the delivery of at least the firsthalted product delivery is configured to reschedule the delivery of thefirst halted product delivery without delaying previously scheduledproduct deliveries that are scheduled for the second delivery day andwere scheduled prior to the identifying that the delivery interruptioncondition existed.
 6. The system of claim 1, wherein the time reservingsystem, in reserving at least the portion of the second delivery day tobe available to allow the customers to reschedule the halted productdeliveries, determines an amount of the second delivery day to bereserved as a function of historic numbers of customers that reschedulehalted product deliveries and the number of the multiple halted productdeliveries.
 7. The system of claim 1, wherein the delivery schedulingcontrol circuit: identifies that at least a threshold quantity ofproduct deliveries, to be picked at the first shopping facility for themultiple halted product deliveries, are yet to be picked by a thresholdperiod of time prior to a scheduled departure on the second delivery dayof at least a first delivery vehicle; issues instructions to define aset of picking schedules that at least one worker is to sequentiallyfollow in picking products to be delivered according to the haltedproduct deliveries, wherein each picking schedule of the set of thepicking schedules directs the picking of products for a portion of theproducts to be delivered on the second delivery day; and issuesinstructions to define a set of sub-delivery routes that each correspondto one of the picking schedules such that the at least one worker picksproducts specified in a subsequent second one of the picking scheduleswhile the first delivery vehicle is delivering products picked based ona previous first picking schedule.
 8. The system of claim 7, wherein thedelivery scheduling control circuit in issuing the instructions todefine the set of sub-delivery routes issues instructions that the setof sub-delivery routes comprise routing to cause the first deliveryvehicle to return to the first shopping facility upon completing each ofa plurality of the set of sub-delivery routes to be loaded with theproducts picked based on a subsequent one of the set of pickingschedules.
 9. The system of claim 1, wherein the time reserving systemis further configured to identify types of products likely to be in moredemand based on a type of interruption event, and identify one or moreof the interrupted deliveries that include one or more of the identifiedtypes of products.
 10. The system of claim 1, wherein the deliveryscheduling system communicates with geographically distributed userdevices each associated with one of a set of multiple differentcustomers of the customers each associated with the halted productdeliveries, accesses calendar data from the user devices, determinesfrom the calendar data for at least the first customer of the set ofmultiple different customers an availability for rescheduling, andapplies one or more of the scheduling rules and limits potentialavailable times presented to the first customer for rescheduling basedon the availability for rescheduling for the first customer.
 11. Thesystem of claim 1, wherein the delivery scheduling system communicateswith geographically distributed user devices each associated with one ofa set of multiple different customers of the customers each associatedwith the halted product deliveries, receives location information fromat least a first user device of the user devices, and applies the one ormore scheduling rules to limit potential available times presented tothe first customer associated with the first user device forrescheduling based on the location information.
 12. A method ofcontrolling deliveries based on an interruption condition, comprising:accessing, by a delivery scheduling control circuit of a deliveryscheduling system comprising a scheduling processor communicativelycoupled with a distributed network, a set of one or more cancellationrules; applying one or more of the set of the one or more cancellationrules to a plurality of sets of different conditions corresponding todifferent geographic areas and identifying, corresponding to a firstretail shopping facility, that a delivery interruption condition existsfor at least a subsequent first delivery day, wherein the interruptioncondition comprises a condition having a predefined relationship with asafety threshold; identifying, by a cancellation system comprising acancellation processor communicatively coupled with the distributednetwork, multiple scheduled product deliveries of the one or moreproduct deliveries, scheduled to be delivered from the first retailshopping facility on the first delivery day, that are to be halted as aresult of the interruption condition; accessing and applying, by a timereserving system comprising a reserving processor communicativelycoupled with the distributed network, a set of one or more timereserving rules and identifying a non-interrupted second delivery daythat occurs in time after the first delivery day; reserving at least aportion of the second delivery day to be available to allow customersassociated with halted product deliveries to reschedule the haltedproduct deliveries, wherein the portion of the second delivery date thatis reserved is based on historic numbers of customers that rescheduledhalted product deliveries relative to a corresponding number of thehalted product deliveries, and block the reserved portion of the seconddelivery day and prevent previously unscheduled deliveries associatedwith the first shopping facility from being scheduled during thereserved portion of the second delivery day; and rescheduling a deliveryof at least a first halted product delivery during the reserved portionof the second delivery day based on communication from a first customer.13. The method of claim 12, further comprising: identifying a firstdelivery location associated with the first customer; and limitingdelivery times available to the first customer in rescheduling thedelivery of the first halted product delivery to a sub-portion of thereserved portion of the second delivery day as a function of the firstdelivery location.
 14. The method of claim 13, further comprising:communicating a notification to the first customer of a delivery time ofa second delivery to a different customer that was previously scheduledfor a second delivery location that is within a threshold distance ofthe first delivery location.
 15. The method of claim 13, furthercomprising: causing a notification to be communicated to a customerassociated with each of the multiple halted product deliveries; andproviding access to a schedule that identifies available times,including available times during the reserve portion of the seconddelivery day, that can be reserved in rescheduling a corresponding oneof the halted product deliveries.
 16. The method of claim 12, whereinthe rescheduling the delivery of at least the first halted productdelivery comprises rescheduling the delivery of the first halted productdelivery without delaying previously scheduled product deliveries thatare scheduled for the second delivery day and were scheduled prior tothe identifying that the delivery interruption condition existed. 17.The method of claim 12, wherein the reserving at least the portion ofthe second delivery day to be available to allow the customers toreschedule the halted product deliveries comprises determining an amountof the second delivery day to be reserved as a function of historicnumbers of customers that reschedule halted product deliveries and thenumber of the multiple halted product deliveries.
 18. The method ofclaim 12, further comprising: identifying that at least a thresholdquantity of product deliveries, to be picked at the first shoppingfacility for the multiple halted product deliveries, are yet to bepicked by a threshold period of time prior to a scheduled departure onthe second delivery day of at least a first delivery vehicle; issuinginstructions to define a set of picking schedules that at least oneworker is to sequentially follow in picking products to be deliveredaccording to the halted product deliveries, wherein each pickingschedule of the set of the picking schedules directs the picking ofproducts for a portion of the products to be delivered on the seconddelivery day; and issuing instructions to define a set of sub-deliveryroutes that each correspond to one of the picking schedules such thatthe at least one worker picks products specified in a subsequent secondone of the picking schedules while the first delivery vehicle isdelivering products picked based on a previous first picking schedule.19. The method of claim 18, wherein the issuing the instructions todefine the set of sub-delivery routes comprises issuing instructionsthat the set of sub-delivery routes comprise routing to cause the firstdelivery vehicle to return to the first shopping facility uponcompleting each of a plurality of the set of sub-delivery routes to beloaded with the products picked based on a subsequent one of the set ofpicking schedules.